Hidden (Book 3 of the Immune Series)

Forgiveness (Part 2)

Sakir

Consciousness comes crawling back, treading the thick gravity that surrounds my body in the darkness. It nestles into my ears first, allowing me to hear the tapping of metal against metal, the snapping of a rubber hand, and water dripping. Then, it enters my nose, and the scent of lemon disinfectant assaults my senses.

Finally, it inserts its gentle fingers into my eyelids, prying them open. My vision is clouded, but I blink, twice, and the room comes into view slowly.

I'm staring overhead at a white ceiling, crossed my black strips of plastic that cut the white into squares. First, I glance down at my body. I'm shirtless, and four small squares have been attached to my bare skin. Wires stretch out from the squares, curling together towards a machine that features a dancing green line against a black backdrop. Numbers flash green on the screen, and I blink a few more times so that they stop blurring.

Heart rate.

Blood pressure.

I nod to myself, letting my head fall back onto the bed that seems to be made of crushed gravel mixed with cement. My wrists and ankles are chained to the bed, and a fifth strap wraps around my waist.

"Oh. You're awake."

Dr. Julien appears beside me, holding a bag of blue liquid. She puts the bag down, wiping the inside of my elbow with a cold wipe. It smells of strong alcohol and stings as she applies pressure.

I open my mouth to form words, but coarse fabric greets my tongue.

"Don't try to talk," she says in a low voice. "You'll only rub the corners of your mouth raw, and I won't waste time fixing minor injuries."

From the same table that she laid the blue bag on, she produces a long needle, breaking the cap off and tossing it to the side. Her tongue sticks out of the side of her mouth as she leans down, inserting the needle into my arm. I wince, willing myself not to move away. It would only make the pain worse.

When she straightens back up, she rolls a metal stand over to me, attaching a long tube to the needle.

It's an IV.

"Do you know what's in this bag?" she asks, hooking the blue bag up on the rack. Gravity pulls the liquid down, and it floods the tube, disappearing into my arm. A second later, fire envelops me.

When I shake my head, she continues.

"It's the virus. The first strand, actually. Since you won't live long enough to tell anyone, there's really no point in lying to you as well, Sakir."

Who has she been lying to? Surely she knows I'm immune. This virus won't do anything but make me uncomfortable. If she's trying to kill me, this isn't the way to do it.

"Here's how your stay in my home will work," she continues, testing the tube by bending and flicking it. "You will be on a steady drip of the virus, rendering you phsyically incapable of fighting back. Your immune system will be so busy with fighting it off that it won't pay attention to the other physical ailments that I inflict upon you.

"You see, I have a job to do. Ashford wants me to create a third strand of the virus, one that can infect everyone, including the immunes. The Decontamination has to be completed, Sakir. Just because one idiotic girl and the kid president managed to create the vaccine again doesn't mean it's over. Ashford will complete what he started."

She wanders across the room, stroking her neck as she scribbles something on a pad of paper. I fight with the gag over my mouth until it slips down onto my chin.

"Why?" I ask, voice hoarse from the pain that reverberates through my body. It's strong but bearable, rendering me tired and sore. I'm surprised at how fast it's working.

She glances over her shoulder at me, raising her eyebrows.

"No one can hear you through the walls, anyway," she mumbles, going back to writing. I guess that means she isn't going to put the gag back. "My reasons are my own. That's none of your business."

"But you started the immunes in the first place! You, Dr. Price, and my dad. You broke the rules and gave the vaccine to your family," I say, watching her pencil freeze mid stroke.

"I did," she whispers, "but that was a mistake, one I will be paying for until it's over. This is the only way to protect them."

Them?

Asking the question out loud seems pointless, and so I keep my mouth shut.

"Either way, while you're incapable of resisting, I'll be searching for your weak point. There has to be a gap somewhere in the wall that vaccine built. I will find it, no matter what I have to do."

Chills run down my body, covering my in a sheen of sweat.

"I'll see you tomorrow," she says, nodding as she hurries out of the only door in the entire room. My head falls back against the mattress.

The digital clock projected on the wall reads eleven thirty p.m. Fatigue from the beating I endured and the constant drip of virus enter my veins hits me like a tidal wave, and I close my eyes.

I should have ran home. If I hadn't tried to start a fight with the guards, maybe I could have sent a message to my father. He'll be worried about me when I don't call him in the next few days. The head cook at the community kitchen will go looking for me. How long will it take people to miss me?

What's worse is knowing that no one could find me if they tried. I'm sure Ashford has hidden this house in the deepest woods he can. I'm helpless, and there's no way out of this. Taking a shaky breath, I listen to the rhythmic beeping of the heart rate monitor, lulled into a sort of hibernation.

Discussion Question(s): So, there you have it. The truth about Doctor Ava Julien. What do you think she's going to do to him? Is this what she's been doing to Mya and Finn?